Albertans most likely among Canadians to set firm holiday spending budgets

Two-thirds of Canadians plan to spend the same this year as they did during the 2017 holiday season: survey

Albertans are more likely than other Canadians to set very firm budgets this holiday shopping season, according to the Retail Council of Canada’s Holiday Shopping Survey 2018 which was released on Wednesday.

Twenty-six per cent of Albertans surveyed said they would be firm on their holiday budget.

The survey also found that 66 per cent of Canadians plan to spend the same amount as they did last year during the 2017 holiday season, with the average intended spend for the 2018 holiday season at $675.

“Although 65 per cent of Canadians plan to have a firm budget for spending during the 2018 holiday season, nearly one in three (28 per cent) ended up spending more than they planned last year during the 2017 holiday season,” said the report.

Other key findings from the survey include:

food/alcohol/sweets for holiday entertaining and clothing on average are the categories anticipated to have the largest shares of Canadians’ holiday season spending in 2018;

home electronics/appliances, home decorations, furniture, personal electronics and sports equipment are the top categories where spending is expected to be lower versus 2017 among Canadians who plan to spend some of their budget on each category this holiday season;

74 per cent of Canadians’ planned holiday season spending is anticipated to be spent on purchases in-store, with the remaining 26 per cent being spent online;

69 per cent will have already started their shopping by the end of November with 28 per cent having already started their shopping;

Black Friday is the most popular day of the holiday season special sale/deal event days with 40 per cent Canadians intending to shop and take advantage of deals on Black Friday this year;

it’s an even split among those who intend to shop on Black Friday 2018 on where they plan to do most of their shopping that day: 50 per cent think they will do most of their shopping in-store while the other half think they will do most of their shopping online;

most Cyber Monday 2018 shopping intenders think they will do most of their shopping online via computer/tablet (60 per cent) or mobile device (19 per cent);

a majority of Boxing Day 2018 shopping intenders (62 per cent) think they will do most of their shopping in-store.

Mario Toneguzzi is a veteran Calgary-based journalist who worked for 35 years for the Calgary Herald, including 12 years as a senior business writer.